By Thom Salo, Founder Sisu Longevity Studio
There is only one Finnish word in widespread use in the English language, and that word is sauna. It is a word with a precise meaning. To call something a sauna, several elements must be present. When any of them are missing, you are in something else.
The room is a wooden box. There is a heat source, traditionally a wood-burning stove, in modern times an electric stove. Both are still common today. The stove heats rocks. There is a water source, usually a bucket and a ladle. You pour water on the rocks, and what rises is the final element, what the Finns call löyly, the steam that swirls through the room and envelops you.
That is the part that makes a sauna a sauna. To me it is almost spiritual. Without löyly, you are not really in a sauna; you are in something else.
Heat Therapy Is Not Sauna
Heat therapy is a category. Sauna is one form of it. Other forms exist and have their uses.
The hot tub is hot water immersion at around 104 degrees. It lacks the wooden room, the stove, the rocks, the steam. The Russian banya and the Turkish hammam are higher-humidity, lower-heat steam rooms, closer cousins to sauna but not the same thing. Infrared cabins have the wooden box but lack the stove, the rocks, the water, and the steam.
In my opinion, Madison Avenue marketers absconded with the word sauna and applied it to infrared as a marketing ploy. Infrared has its own benefits, but sauna is a Finnish word with a distinct meaning. Calling a thing by the wrong name does not change what it is.
Why Authentic at Sisu
Of all heat modalities, the Finnish sauna is the most researched. Decades of cohort data out of Finland, most prominently the work of Dr. Jari Laukkanen and colleagues, link regular sauna use to reductions in cardiovascular mortality, dementia risk, and all-cause mortality. The research base is one of the reasons we use an authentic Finnish sauna at Sisu Longevity Studio. We wanted the science.
But the science is not the only reason.
Our sauna seats fourteen. That is intentional. Communal bathing was a near-universal feature of pre-modern life. The Finnish sauna, the Russian banya, the Turkish hammam, the Roman thermae, the Japanese sento. Different cultures, different practices, all built around the idea that the bath was a public space, not a private one. The village or the neighborhood had a shared bathing place where everyone went. Indoor plumbing in the twentieth century erased that gathering point in much of the world. Part of why sauna is having a moment in the United States right now is that people are reaching for community, and the sauna bench is one of the places they can find it. The cohort you train with is the cohort you sauna with. Recovery is shared.
All heat therapies produce a similar physiological signature: heat shock proteins, growth hormone, vasodilation. Pair the heat with cold immersion, whether a plunge tub, a lake, or a snow bank, and the vasoconstriction completes the loop. That alternation is contrast therapy, and it creates a metabolic pump the heat alone cannot. We cover the science of contrast therapy in detail on our Resources page; this piece is about the heat side, and what makes it real.
How to Sauna
I am often asked what the right way to sauna is. The research describes specific protocols. Susanna Søberg’s principle of alternating sauna and cold and finishing on cold. Dr. Laukkanen’s findings on weekly minutes for long-term benefit. Those are useful guides.
Our philosophy is simpler. There is no right way to sauna. There is the way you enjoy.
The point is to come, to use it, and to come back. Wear a wool hat the way the Finns do. You may notice in the video I changed mine more than once, which is part of the fun. Add an essence to the water for aroma. Personalize the experience. (We do require clothing, on this side of the Atlantic.) When you add löyly, ask the others on the bench whether they want more steam. That part is etiquette. We will walk you through the rest when you arrive.
Our authentic Finnish sauna is a cornerstone of the recovery side of Sisu Longevity Studio. Come visit. Sit on the bench. Pour the water. Step into the cold plunge. Take advantage of what regular sauna use offers across decades.
Live Better … Longer.
